Sabato: Every time the House has flipped …

posted at 4:32 pm on September 2, 2010 by Ed Morrissey

Kathryn Jean Lopez looks at the latest analysis from political prognosticator Larry Sabato, who has decided that he has been too conservative in his estimation of the chances for a Republican takeover of the House. The GOP needs a 39-seat switch to retire Nancy Pelosi as Speaker, and until now, Sabato has kept his predictions to the 30-and-under range. Taking into account the nosediving fortunes of Democrats both nationally and in each district, Sabato now sees a likelihood of Republican control of the House:

Given what we can see at this moment, Republicans have a good chance to win the House by picking up as many as 47 seats, net. This is a “net” number since the GOP will probably lose several of its own congressional districts in Delaware, Hawaii, and Louisiana. This estimate, which may be raised or lowered by Election Day, is based on a careful district-by-district analysis, plus electoral modeling based on trends in President Obama’s Gallup job approval rating and the Democratic-versus-Republican congressional generic ballot (discussed later in this essay). If anything, we have been conservative in estimating the probable GOP House gains, if the election were being held today.

Don’t just skip over that cautionary note at the end. Anything can happen in the next few weeks to stall Republican momentum nationwide, or in individual races. The GOP is especially vulnerable to sudden shifts since they have so many fresh faces running for Congress this year, and inexperienced candidates can make mistakes. Activists and organizers need to keep their energy and efforts up.

Assuming that the GOP maintains momentum, Sabato has another interesting point about the history of changes in control of the House:

If the Republican wave on November 2 is as large as some polls are suggesting it may be, then the surprise on election night could be a full GOP takeover. Since World War II, the House of Representatives has flipped parties on six occasions (1946, 1948, 1952, 1954, 1994, and 2006). Every time, the Senate flipped too, even when it had not been predicted to do so. These few examples do not create an iron law of politics, but they do suggest an electoral tendency.

A couple of caveats on that, too. First, the previous Senate flips didn’t require as many seats to change parties as it does this year. Sabato has increased his prediction of net Republican gain in the upper chamber to eight seats, possibly nine. The latter would set up a 50-50 tie, unless Ben Nelson of Nebraska decided to flip and save himself from a Republican challenge in 2012. Also, the GOP has the same exposure to game-changing errors in Senate races from rookies, and much less margin of error in terms of winning control. Republicans will have to nearly run the table to make it happen.

But for the first time, Sabato doesn’t think an outright win for Republicans in the Senate is out of the question. And in this case, history could be on their side.

Update: The Cook Report has also adjusted its outlook for Republicans upward:

At some point in every election cycle, the outlook for the Senate begins to look more like a mathematical equation and less like a collection of individual races. With 61 days to go before the election, we’ve now hit that point. The math equation for the Senate is divided into two parts; the macro political environment, and the 37 races on the ballot this year. The macro political landscape strongly favors Republicans and it is not likely that it will change much between now and November. As a result, a look at the 37 Senate races on the ballot shows some deterioration for Democrats in some of the 19 seats they are defending, while Republicans’ prospects have stayed the same or improved slightly in their most competitive seats. As such, it is now likely that Republicans will score a net gain of between seven and nine seats. While there is a plausible argument for how Republicans could net the 10 seats they need to win the majority, it remains an unlikely scenario today.

That 7-9 range will still be a big win — and don’t forget that Democrats have more seats to defend in 2012 than Republicans.

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The fear that will set in if the demonrats hold both the House and the Senate is incomprehensible. The thought of Obama running unchecked through bill after bill of destruction for our country and our economy could be the end of a way of life that this nation has preserved since the founding fathers. NOvember could easily be the most important election in our nation’s history.

Any or all of these could decide to caucus with the GOP. The Republicans could get Lieberman if they promise he will keep his chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee. Not much diff between him and Susan Collins anyway, and Collions might rather have Small Business. I don’t see any Republicans tempted to cross over, not after this election. Specter was the last one they will ever get.

Remember the timing of the Mark Foley story.
If ANY GOP congress critters have any skeletons in their closets that have potential to be found by the MFM and libs, look for it soon.

carbon_footprint on September 2, 2010 at 4:44 PM

There has been a rumor for a while that the Dems are holding a story about some high-ranking Repub having an affair with a female lobbyist. May even be more than one. Not sure I believe it; if they had something like this they should have played it by now and hammered the GOP with it during the recess like they did with Foley in 2006.

There has been a rumor for a while that the Dems are holding a story about some high-ranking Repub having an affair with a female lobbyist. May even be more than one. Not sure I believe it; if they had something like this they should have played it by now and hammered the GOP with it during the recess like they did with Foley in 2006.

rockmom on September 2, 2010 at 4:50 PM

Are you sure it isn’t the same “McCain had an affair!” BS that the NY Times pushed in 2008 warmed over or perhaps a new twist on the “Ensign had an affair” crap?

Frankly, I think they went all-out in toasting a lot of the scandal-tinged Republicans in 2006 and 2008 between Foley, Larry Craig, and others.

Larry Ssbato is a dem and has shortchanged all his estimates, even when polls were suggesting a seachange was at work. Now, in order to maintain credibility he has upped his estimates. Cook is more reliable. Try to get readings from internal polling and the coming election is going to be a disaster for the dems…..count on it.

I don’t believe that a sex scandal just before Nov. would do much damage this time. Most voters who are thinking about voting for an R just want someone who will stop the bleeding and put the public sector back in the box. If a story is released, barring that it is with a 12 year old boy, I think the best line would be “I did not have sex with that woman”. How could any reporter not fall on the floor laughing?

You know, see that and it reminds me of people saying “sometimes a loss is better than a win” It ain’t true. Winning is alway better than losing and being in the majority is always better than being in the minority.

What did our strong minority get in the last two years? The progressives passed unconstitutional Obamacare, they passed an ineffective and wasted stimulas which exceeded the total cost of the Iraq war, they takeover of auto companies, they passed financial reform so useless it didn’t even deal with Freddie and Fannie!

Sabato also noted that the forecast can change suddenly; in 1962 Reublicans were expected to gain significantly in the midterms, but the Cuban Missile Crisis rallied support for JFK and the democratics, by association. Dems only lost 4 in the House, and gained 2 in the Senate as a result.

(This is of course before it was realized that it all happened because of JFK’s incredible incompetence.)

I think there’s absolutely zero chance of Tester switching parties. (The “progressives” here like Tester, and think Baucus is a DINO.) But there is a chance he could decide not to run again in ’12, and try to succeed Schweitzer (term limited) as governor that year.

What did our strong minority get in the last two years? The progressives passed unconstitutional Obamacare, they passed an ineffective and wasted stimulas which exceeded the total cost of the Iraq war, they takeover of auto companies, they passed financial reform so useless it didn’t even deal with Freddie and Fannie!

Strong minority? Double bullshit! It didn’t get us a damn thing.

Sorry for the rant.

WisRich on September 2, 2010 at 5:19 PM

I agree. It is starting to make me really mad when people say Bush was just as bad! That is not true. Bush bent over backwards to keep the stupid traitors on board for the war. Okay he spent too much, but he had a lot of push from the Dems, who turned around and stabbed him in the back!

But look at what happens when the Democrats get complete control! The gates of hell open up and swallow our Republic! The entire world collapses!

This could be it for the country our forefathers founded!

If we can’t beat back socialism now it will happen next time we let them have power. They got so close. They had a plan and were ready to exploit the crisis and scare the rubes who voted for Obama into selling their souls into slavery.

If not for Fox and talk radio things would be far far different and we would be trying to figure out how we lost so much freedom so very fast. We would have never known the truth because the Pravda media would spin it as the only option.

People have got to reject the Obama, Pelosi, Reid way of governing as strongly as is humanly possible or they will try it again.

Liberal/socialism/communism has to be dead in America at the end of this election. Then we have to keep up the fight so we can bury this new slave ideology in 2012.

We have to start paying the bills in late November. I mean we have to make whatever sacrifice necessary to get us out of the financial mess we have allowed to happen. This is the consequence of being part of the me generation. Now those of us who never bought into it in the first place need to fix it.